


i dreamt of another life

by injeong



Series: picking up the pieces [3]
Category: Merlin (TV)
Genre: Alternate Universe - Modern Setting, Amnesiac Merlin, Angst, Angst and Hurt/Comfort, Angst with a Happy Ending, Arthur Knows About Merlin's Magic (Merlin), Arthur Pendragon Returns (Merlin), But in a magic context, Dissociative Identity Disorder, Emotional Hurt/Comfort, Fluff and Angst, Gen, Hospitals, I didn't intend to write this as M/M but it kinda has very heavily implied Merthur, Kinda, M/M, Magic, Magic Gone Wrong, Memory Loss, Memory Magic, Protective Arthur, Psychiatrist Lancelot, Sort Of, Temporary Amnesia
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2020-06-26
Updated: 2020-06-30
Packaged: 2021-03-03 22:33:22
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: Creator Chose Not To Use Archive Warnings
Chapters: 3
Words: 9,714
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/24933061
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/injeong/pseuds/injeong
Summary: A young psychiatrist in the twenty-first century, Lancelot has been transferred to work in the psychiatric ward of a different hospital. One of the long-term patients there, a man who calls himself "Merlin", catches his eye, and it's not until he meets him that he realizes why.OR: Merlin has had enough of immortality and attempts to erase his memories of the pain of the last thousand years. A newly reincarnated Lancelot finds him, his psyche split into two by the failed spell, and attempts to convince Merlin not to complete the spell and to accept his memories. Later, Arthur, fresh out of the lake, learns of Merlin's condition and does his best to help his friend. (or boyfriend, you can read it however you want)(Can be read as a standalone fic, the rest of the series doesn't really contribute to this fic plot-wise)
Relationships: Lancelot & Merlin (Merlin), Lancelot/Merlin (Merlin), Merlin & Arthur Pendragon (Merlin), Merlin/Arthur Pendragon (Merlin)
Series: picking up the pieces [3]
Series URL: https://archiveofourown.org/series/1795348
Comments: 9
Kudos: 230





	1. Remembrance

**Author's Note:**

> Although the mental condition Merlin was "diagnosed" with in this fic was actually a spell gone wrong, I did try my best to not wrongly represent Dissociative Identity Disorder in the parts where I wrote about it. If I accidentally ended up writing something that may offend anyone, I'm very sorry, please let me know and I'll do my best to fix it. 
> 
> On another note, this is enough angst for a lifetime and quarantine means I get need more fluff and crack so the next fic in this series is going to be another collection of shenanigans and magic. :)

Lancelot doesn't remember. 

He stares down at the patients' files in his hands, flipping through them as he stands in his recently vacated office (all of his belongings had already been transferred his new quarters, where he would be specialising in the long-term patients in the hospital's psychiatric ward). There weren't so many of them - it was rare to have properly long-term patients, after all - in the modern age, greater understanding and kindness towards those with mental illnesses meant that often, many of the patients were able to live outside the hospital, lead relatively normal lives. 

But one catches his eye. A John Doe, who had turned up on the steps of the hospital unable to remember anything of his past and with no records, who only remembered the word, "Merlin". He seemed to think it was his name - although with no medical history and no birth records, no match for his DNA, and nobody able to identify the man, the simple name of a man from the legends didn't seem to prove anything. 

Lancelot pauses on his file. The name he knew, growing up in Britain, a vague knowledge of some old legend he never really understood, but somehow, strangely, felt connected to. 

Something feels familiar. Achingly familiar, almost, and for a moment Lancelot physically flinches - it feels like there's something inside of him, something tearing and clawing at his insides to try and fight their way out, trying to make itself known - but in the end, it's muffled again, silenced, and his heart rate settles back down to normal. 

He doesn't remember. 

  
  


He remember, finally, four days later. 

After finishing arranging his office into something he can work with, Lancelot is led around the hospital's halls by one of the more experienced nurses, who shows him the facilities, which areas to look out for, what to expect. They're walking through the sunlight, mostly empty corridors of the long-term wards, when the nurse is called over by a colleague, and they disappear around a corner for a few minutes. 

Only moments after they've disappeared, a flicker of movement out of the corner of his eye catches his attention and Lancelot turns towards it, curious. A white door, where a small, handwritten plaque hangs, reading simply "Merlin". Through the glass window in the door, Lancelot sees a dark-haired young man sitting at a desk, seemingly scribbling something onto a notepad, his back turned. 

And there it is again - that strange, painful feeling of forgotten remembrance that he felt a few days earlier. Lancelot frowns, wondering if the stabbing, aching feeling that's rooted so deep in his chest is an indication of some medical problem he needs to check out. He's never had anything like this before. 

He can't seem to tear his eyes away. 

Then the man turns his head slightly, not enough for Lancelot to see his face, but enough for his pale, crystal-blue eyes to catch the light, his brow furrowed in an expression of thought that seems familiar - no. Not just familiar. 

Lancelot staggers back, as if something had physically pushed him.

It's an expression he _knows_. 

The man - _Merlin_ , he thinks, he screams in his mind, his eyes flicking wildly up to the name plaque - Merlin, not the distant figure from an ancient legend but the man who was his friend, who is turning back away from him, scrawling something else down onto the pad and -

_Where does he know Merlin from? Where -_

When the memories come, they come all at once. 

He must have collapsed, because when he comes to, he's on his knees, his face inches from the floor, heart pounding in his chest so loud he's surprised nobody has come running to see what the source of that loud, loud thundering is. His mouth is filled with the acrid taste of shock and anxiety and confusion, and when he reaches up to swipe away the stray tears that he doesn't remember spilling, he feels his skin damp with sweat. 

All of the sudden, the world, this world he grew up in, seems so _alien_ \- he stares at the white overalls on his sleeves, almost aghast - all the memories he grew up with seem to vanish, chased into some dark and dusty corner of his mind by memories of another, different life, one with rolling green hills and grey walls of a great but homely castle, and the fluttering red capes that they wore - that _he_ wore, chainmail glittering silver in the sun, horses and druids and walking into the veil and the cold, empty arms reaching out to consume him. 

He almost throws up. 

_I died,_ he thinks, reeling. 

Then - _I shouldn't be here._

 _How_? 

All to quickly, he hears footsteps approaching, and remembers he's lying in an undignified heap in the middle of a corridor. Scrambling to his feet, he spends a frantic few seconds trying to fix his appearance before the nurse he was with just a few minutes ago rounds the corner again, raising an eyebrow at his visibly dishevelled appearance.

"You look like you just ran a marathon," she says, amused. 

Lancelot tries to smile back, but it probably ended up looking more like a grimace. 

"Yeah," he says, awkwardly. "I - um - tripped." He gestures vaguely towards his shoes, both of which have securely tied shoelaces. The nurse doesn't seem to notice, however, looking instead towards the door that separates them and Merlin. 

"What do you think?" She says, and Lancelot blinks, surprised. "Looks like a nice guy, doesn't he? It's a shame that he has to stay here all day."

 _Here_? 

It takes Lancelot an embarrassingly long moment to remember where he is. A hospital. The psychiatric ward of a hospital - and Merlin. _Why is Merlin here?_

"He does," he replies, glancing towards Merlin and once again finding himself unable to look away. The nervous energy is still shooting through his body, and he fights to stop his hands from shaking. "Why ... why is he here? In a locked ward, even?"

The nurse shrugs. "I'm not a psychologist. From what I've heard, though, they think he's struggling with a really severe case of Dissociative Identity Disorder - most of the time he's a nice, friendly guy, nicer than some of the people who work around here. Other times, though, apparently, he does a complete one-eighty and flips - different voice, different name, and rambling." She starts walking again, and Lancelot trails after her, in a daze. "I've never seen it - it doesn't happen very often, I think. Nobody can make any sense out of him when he's like that."

_That doesn't sound like Merlin._

Worry twisting in his gut, Lancelot hurries to catch up. "Does anyone know why?" 

"He can't remember anything before he ended up on the steps of the hospital," the nurse answers, frowning. "I've seen him for physical check-ups more than once, though - he has the strangest scarring all over his body. I'm not quite sure what caused a lot of them - there's one that looks like a burn, perfectly circular, right in the middle of his chest. My guess would be a history of severe physical neglect and abuse, perhaps as a child. That kind of past can often cause young children to develop mental disorders like this."

The nurse continues talking, about whether they could use the scarring as evidence to try and trace his identity, and whether Lancelot would be willing to help out in trying to find a theory to who the mystery man was and where he came from, but Lancelot has long since stopped listening. He follows her like a mindless ghost, back to his office, where he manages to rouse himself enough to say goodbye and shut the door before collapsing into his chair and staring blankly at the white walls in front of him.

It's not just Camelot, either. He spent the walk back to his office sifting through the decades of memories suddenly deposited into his mind, and now sits at his desk, images flashing before his eyes like a dizzyingly fast film. He sees wooden platforms with tall, rectangular sheets of bloodstained, shining metal, surrounded by clamouring men with swords in strange outfits of white and red and blue. He sees cannons and horses and white flashes of sunlight glancing of the hundreds of sabres waving in the heavy air. He sees explosions and blurry black lines of shrapnel flying through gritty air, and bodies in khaki uniforms forming an ocean of death over the roughly dug trenches. He sees more lifetimes than any mortal man should have. 

He tries to think, and nothing comes to his mind. Numbly, an endless, wordless sentence trails on through his mind. There's a strange ringing in his ears. 

_I don't know what to do,_ he thinks, finally. Then he thinks; _Merlin_. 

He's out of his chair and hurrying down the corridor before he realises it, barely keeping himself from breaking into a run. The few people he passes gives him strange looks - no doubt his desperation is bleeding through onto his face. 

On the way there, he continues making more and more realisations, none of which offers any comfort. It's the twenty-first century. Camelot, Albion, everything is long gone. History. Legends, even. Arthur, Gwen, the knights. All dead. Long dead. Or maybe like him - maybe alive, somehow, miraculously. Living again and again over all those centuries. (He hopes, he hopes - he doesn't know what he's going to do if it's only him and the not-quite-Merlin in this strange, strange world.) 

He finds the door, the small, simple name tag stuck to the front. Fumbling for a moment to unlock the door, he steps inside, overcome with a strange sort of trepidation - he doesn't know what he's going to find. 

Fear was nothing new to him. This much he remembers - a knight of Camelot, on the front lines in a battle between two sides of magic and unimaginable creatures. But this is different. So, so different. 

He shuts the door quietly behind him. The young man sitting at the desk doesn't seem to notice, staring out of the window as if in a trance. 

Lancelot tries to speak, but comes up with only air. He clears his throat quietly, trying again.

"Merlin," he says, barely audible. Then a little louder. "Merlin."

Merlin turns around, meeting his eyes, and in that moment, Lancelot's hope shatters. 

This is not Merlin. 

The stranger wearing Merlin's face tilts his head curiously. "Hi," he says, not a hint of recognition in his blue eyes - shallow, pale blue eyes, so similar to the ones he knew and yet different, as if someone put a curtain behind them and shut them off to everything that made him Merlin. "I haven't seen you around before. Are you new?"

_Remember me, remember me, remember -_

"Yes," Lancelot says, putting on what he hopes is a friendly expression. "Sorry for barging in like this. My name's Lancelot, by the way." He holds out his hand. 

Not-Merlin's face splits into a grin, a familiar yet slightly _wrong_ expression that once again feels like a punch to his gut. "Lancelot? Like from the King Arthur legends? You too? That's so cool!" He laughs. "I'm Merlin," he says, shaking his hand. "Or, at least, I think that's what I'm called. It was the only thing I remembered when I came here."

_Remember, remember, remember -_

Lancelot raises an eyebrow. "You didn't remember anything else?

Merlin frowns thoughtfully. "No," he says. "None of the other doctors know why. They've tried all sorts of things - talk therapy, hypnosis, pills ..." He shrugs, seemingly unbothered (and he still looks at Lancelot like a stranger. Like he doesn't know him, after everything they went through together, and it's not _right_ -) and Lancelot feels his hope slipping away second by second. "I wish I knew. I have so many questions about myself. But on the other hand, some ... weird part of me tells me that I'm better off not remembering." 

_It's been over a thousand years,_ Lancelot thinks. Merlin was here, so he must be like him - stuck in some strange, eternal loop of living and dying every so now and then over the centuries. He must be - there wouldn't be any other explanation for why he was still here. 

Then he remembers something else that makes his heart almost stop. Merlin has magic. Powerful magic. He hadn't managed to figure everything out by the time he first died, but from the things he'd heard and put together, Merlin was more than just powerful. 

A name pokes at the corner of his mind. Emrys. 

Emrys. _Forever_. 

He remembers reading something, in a book he found. One about the Arthurian legends, those strange, distant stories he always somehow felt connected to. (He knows why, now. He was part of them.) 

_The name Emrys means Immortal and is of Welsh origin ..._

_Immortal_ , Lancelot thinks, horrified. He doesn't want to come to the conclusion he just came to. From the desk, the unrecognisable Merlin watches him curiously, his eyes still flat and distant. 

"Lancelot?"

Has he been alive this entire time? The thought of it makes him shudder. It was different for Lancelot - it was bearable for him. He grew up without that knowledge, and now that he remembers, several of his past lifetimes he had spent without ever knowing where he truly came from, the people he was originally born and raised with, the people he grew to love, the people he died for. 

But if Merlin had been alive - immortal - this entire time, then - then -

 _Fifteen hundred years,_ Lancelot thinks hollowly. He would have watched, unable to leave, as everyone he knew and loved died. As Arthur's kingdom, as Camelot fell, and Albion disappeared, recalled only faintly as some distant legend. As the world changed and civilisations grew and fell, and all the while _remembering_ , years upon decades upon centuries of heavy, heavy memories ...

_" ... some weird part of me tells me that I'm better off not remembering."_

Of course. 

"Lancelot?" Not-Merlin says again, quizzically. Lancelot blinks, and looks again into the face of his friend, worn by a stranger. _Oh, god_ \- Merlin must have crumbled under the weight of his memories - it would have been too much for any human to bear, destined warlock or not. The Merlin that Lancelot knew was strong - stronger than anyone else, capable of suffering and fighting and doing it all in silence, saving the people and the kingdom again and again from the shadows and greeting them with a smile and laughter the next day. 

But he was also human. So, so human. He felt so deeply, with all his heart. 

Lancelot swallows the lump in his throat. 

_I'm sorry,_ he says, not to the increasingly puzzled man in front of him who doesn't know who he is, but to the friend buried somewhere deep beneath. _I'm so, so sorry._

"It's nothing," he says finally, shakily. "I'm fine."

Barely remembering how to do his job, Lancelot drifts vaguely through the first week of work. After the first few days, the headaches that come with each attempt to sift through his several lifetimes' worth of memories become less painful, and he's able to at least make sense of a few things. He uses his laptop in his spare time, looking up historical dates and events - and it's such a strange feeling, looking at paintings of the French Revolution and World War Two, and distinctly remembering, _I was there._

And Merlin. Lancelot finds references to him in the legends, and some imagined artists' interpretations of an old wizard that looks nothing like his friend, but the internet is so vast, and so modern, he finds no way of confirming that Merlin had indeed been alive, immortal, ever since Camelot. He knows Merlin would have been smart enough to not parade such a fact (he hadn't liked unnecessary attention, anyway, even back then) but a clue, perhaps, anything, to hint at why he had receded into his mind now - and if there was any way to bring him back. 

His later conversations with Merlin do little to help. He had read repeatedly his medical records that only extended as far as a few months, and the notes of the other psychologists and therapists that had worked with him, and he can't make sense of any of it. The split personality that they thought Merlin had developed - could it be the real Merlin? His Merlin, with all his magic and memories of immortality that he wanted to forget?

"I don't remember switching," Merlin tells him, in one of their early sessions. "It's like, maybe I might feel weirdly sad or angry for no reason? Then I'll blank out and come back a few minutes later with a memory gap and more weird feelings."

"Feelings?" Lancelot probes. 

"Sad, like I said," says Merlin, lying on his stomach on the couch. "Usually really, really sad, but kind of ... muffled? Lonely, too." He rolls over, staring up at the ceiling. "I wonder what happened." 

Lancelot stifles a small sigh, pushing down the throbbing pain in his chest. _You watched hundreds of lifetimes of people die._ "That's what we're trying to find out," he says instead. 

Merlin had called his alter ego a "really sad, angry, lonely twin that comes out sometimes when I'm not noticing," once. Lancelot flicks through the notes left by the previous psychologist. 

_delusion?,_ scrawled in the centre of the page _. no matching record of young man called Merlin (consult hospitals in other countries?)_

_merlin - arthurian legend. childhood fairy-tale?_

Then, a few lines underneath: 

_possible coping method = trauma?_  
_"I never asked to be Emrys" - responsibility?_

"Never asked to be Emrys ..." Lancelot taps the words with his pen. That wasn't something written about in the modern legends. Did that mean Merlin's alter ego _was_ his true self, with all his memories? 

He flips over the page.

_patient likes to call alter ego "Emrys"_  
_does not appear to know much about his alter ego_

_amnesia - physical trauma or coping method?_

The more he reads into it, the more Lancelot is torn. He wants Merlin - _his_ Merlin, Camelot's Merlin, his closest friend - back, overwhelmingly so in this foreign future. It pains him to see him like this - a shell, hollowed out and shallow, of the great man he was before. He doesn't deserve it. 

But from what he can guess, Merlin became this way because of what he was. Lancelot wants Merlin back, but to force his friend to remember the very things that had sent him spiralling before - wouldn't that be cruel? 

He doesn't deserve to suffer anymore like that, either. 

Of course, that's not the only possible explanation, he figures. Perhaps another sorcerer had cursed Merlin in a moment of weakness, trapped his true self inside an amnesiac body so that he couldn't interfere with his plans. Perhaps he had tried to perform a complicated, powerful spell that had gone badly wrong, attacking the caster's memories and psyche instead. Perhaps Merlin hadn't wanted to forget, perhaps he was trying his best to return. 

_King Arthur's messianic return is an aspect of the legend of King Arthur, the mythical 6th-century British king ..._

Arthur hadn't returned (had he?), so Merlin - Merlin wouldn't have given up so easily. There wasn't anything in the world stronger, Lancelot thinks, than Merlin's loyalty to his king, his friend and other half. 

He wouldn't have given up like that. 

Lancelot tries to convince himself, but even to his own mind, it sounds like hopeless wishing. 

It's been fifteen hundred years, and the world has faced disaster after disaster. If Arthur was meant to return in their time of need, wouldn't he have come already? 

Somewhere along the way, Lancelot fabricates a childhood friend with a similarly severe case of Dissociative Identity Disorder. He uses it, almost as an excuse.

"I helped him a little," he says, whenever someone asks why he paid such special attention to the case that most of the hospital had given up on already. "Maybe I can help Merlin too."

It seems to work - it's a small hospital, and humans, he's realised, have such short, frantic lives. They don't bother questioning him further, instead turning their focus to something else that catches their attention within a matter of minutes. Lancelot turns back to his notes, and reads them again and again, trying to find something new that might help him figure out something, anything. Why Merlin disappeared into himself. How to help him return - if he even wanted to.

He spends a week, then two, then three, wandering around the hospital, carrying out his appointments with his other patients, and spending the rest of the time watching Merlin. If he could just catch a glimpse of "Emrys", talk to him, even, then maybe he could make sure. 

He wishes, hoping, during every appointment where Merlin smiles and laughs and acts normal, but not like _Merlin_ did. Nothing ever happens, and over the days Lancelot begins to both lose hope and also dread it happening. 

If Merlin - the real Merlin - told him that he took his own memories for a reason, reduced himself to a hollow shell because he wanted it, he doesn't know what he'll do. 

It's been three weeks, and no sign of Emrys. 

Even Merlin is confused. 

"He normally comes out at least once a month or so," he says, looking to Lancelot as if _he'll_ have the answer. "I haven't had any memory blanks for ages. I can still feel him, sometimes, but he never fully ..." 

Lancelot looks at him, pensive. 

Did the real Merlin sense him, somehow? Was he deliberately avoiding him? 

"I don't know," he says at last, heavily. Merlin looks almost disappointed. "I don't think I'm able to do much, at this point. Merlin -" he still almost chokes on the word, using it to address a stranger that looks at him so blankly, unknowingly, the name of his friend - "- tell me as soon as possible if he returns. Alright? I'd - I'd like to talk to him."

"Will do!"

Lancelot stands, turning to leave Merlin's room. 

Once again, nothing. 

He hesitates at the door, his hand brushing the doorknob. There must be something. _Surely, something._

_Merlin._

Then he feels something brush against his face, a tiny breeze in a room with a closed window, and freezes. The wind carries with it a scent he remembers distantly, the faintest traces of magic, shining gossamer threads. 

_Oh._

From behind him, Merlin speaks.

"Lancelot."

A name, his name, but spoken so differently, in a voice that sounded both young and ancient, quiet and cracked and desperate, worn with time and pain.

Lancelot turns, slowly, hoping, with anxiety curling dreadful knots in his stomach, and his eyes land once again on Merlin, _Merlin_ , a small figure sitting on the edge of the bed, his face suddenly so much more shadowed and weary that a few seconds ago. Out from underneath his dark curls, two crystal-clear blue eyes shine, laced with wisps of crackling, fiery gold. 


	2. Revelation

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> Emrys reveals himself to Lancelot. He had been right in his assumption that "Emrys" was the true, forgotten Merlin - but he had not estimated how damaged he was.

_Lancelot stands, turning to leave Merlin's room._

_Once again, nothing._

_He hesitates at the door, his hand brushing the doorknob. There must be something. Surely, something._

_Merlin._

_Then he feels something brush against his face, a tiny breeze in a room with a closed window, and freezes. The wind carries with it a scent he remembers distantly, the faintest traces of magic, shining gossamer threads._

_Oh._

_From behind him, Merlin speaks._

_"Lancelot."_

_A name, his name, but spoken so differently, in a voice that sounded both young and ancient, quiet and cracked and desperate, worn with time and pain._

_Lancelot turns, slowly, hoping, with anxiety curling dreadful knots in his stomach, and his eyes land once again on Merlin, Merlin/, a small figure sitting on the edge of the bed, his face suddenly so much more shadowed and weary that a few seconds ago. Out from underneath his dark curls, two crystal-clear blue eyes shine, laced with wisps of crackling, fiery gold._

Lancelot drops everything he's holding, and takes a small, cautious step forward. 

"It's you," he whispers. Merlin - _his_ Merlin, the real Merlin - doesn't move, continuing to stare up at him silently, with that broken, broken look in his eyes.

_How did it get that bad?_

It hurts just to look at him. 

Lancelot moves closer, his anxiety growing with every passing second of silence. 

"Merlin," he says, unable to keep his horror out of his voice. "What _happened_ to you?"

The silence begins bordering on agonising, then finally, Merlin answers. 

"Me," he offers, slowly. His voice is almost unrecognisable. "Life. Time." He lets out a strange noise that might have been a laugh. Another part of Lancelot's heart shatters at the sound. 

"You do remember everything," Lancelot says, stumbling over his words. He knows he does - he doesn't need the magic swirling through the air, doesn't need the glowing golden eyes that reflect centuries of painful history to know. "But you never - you stay underneath - why?" 

The strange sound again, but quieter, more like a cry than a laugh. "Reasons." He looks up again, and Lancelot sucks in a breath at the agony in his ancient gaze. "Hurts," he says, the word twisted almost beyond recognition. "Lonely. _Lonely_."

Merlin doesn't answer him directly, but it's enough. Lancelot knows.

"You did this to yourself?" he says, hushed, horrified. "Deliberately. You locked yourself up." 

Merlin dips his head a fraction. It barely counts as a nod, and Lancelot's worst fears are confirmed. 

"You wanted this."

Again, that hoarse, ragged sound. "Wouldn't you?"

Lancelot doesn't know what to say to that. The person - barely a person - that's sitting in front of him looks so fragile, world-weary and exhausted, and he's terrified that one wrong word, one mistake, and Merlin will disappear forever. 

"Let me help you," he says, desperately. "Merlin. Please. I can - tell me what to do, I - I'll help, I can ..." 

But really, what can he do? 

Merlin's eyes are glittering faintly, not just from the golden swirls of magic, but from a sheen of unspilled tears. He finally drops his gaze, and Lancelot's breath hitches. Merlin doesn't seem to notice he's there, anymore.

"What's the point?" he murmurs, staring at his hands. "You'll just leave, too." 

"No. _No_ \- Merlin -"

Lancelot reaches out for him, but before he can make contact, the golden sparks vanish from Merlin's eyes, and his entire body posture shifts, snapping upright in confusion. His Merlin disappears back into himself, and Lancelot is left staring at the slightly disorientated expression on Not-Merlin's face. 

"... huh." Not-Merlin rubs at his eyes. "Tears ...? Oh, Emrys must have come out again." He wipes at his face again. "I was wondering where he went ..." 

Looking up again, he must have noticed the distress visible on Lancelot's face, because he gives him a reassuring grin. 

"Emrys can be sort of scary, if you've never seen him before," he says, misinterpreting his expression. "He's harmless, really. He's just sad." 

It takes a few moments for Lancelot to choke down the emotions that clog his throat. "I know," he whispers. 

He can't get the image of Merlin's broken look out of his head for days. 

  
Merlin shouldn't stay that way. Lancelot has convinced himself of that. 

He knows, now, how Merlin wished to retreat from the world, how he did this of his own accord. But if it was a spell, or a ritual, meant to completely erase the pain, then it hadn't worked. Because some stray part of Merlin is still there - still there with all the memories and agony that he had intended to wipe away. He is still suffering, and Lancelot has to do something about it. 

There has to be a way to help him, and he is going to find it. He isn't sure exactly what would help him - he doesn't know of any professional counsellor that would be willing (or equipped) to help an immortal sorcerer from the medieval period through his lifetimes worth of trauma, and he is certainly under-equipped to do so. He knows what Merlin says he wants - to disappear - but even if it was the only way, Lancelot wouldn't be able to bring himself to go through with it. 

_That's not what he really wants,_ he says to himself, several times a day. _Not really. He wants to live, and love, just like everyone else. I just need to find a way to remind him._

Merlin hasn't spoken to him since that first time. Lancelot doesn't know how magic works, and in the twenty-first century, it's harder than ever to find legitimate sources on magic that might help him. (He doesn't even know if magic exists anymore, besides Merlin.) 

Perhaps there might be a primary source from the era of Camelot, a druid writing, a stone tablet inscribed with a spell - anything, anything to help. 

Anything to help Merlin remember. To bring him back, so Lancelot can ... 

_What would I do, even if I bring him back?_

No. Lancelot turns himself away from that train of thought, bringing his attention back to the historical archives he's scrolling through on his computer. There would be a way to help Merlin. He's confident, wants to believe that he's confident enough, that there's a way to reverse the damaged spell, or curse, that broke Merlin into two pieces and hid one piece away inside of himself. He can help him, but only if Merlin is whole enough for him to help. 

He finds one of the ways he might be able to reach Merlin the day after he talked to him. There's a stack of sketchbooks on the desk in Merlin's room, filled with strange drawings and tangles of colour. 

"I use them whenever I think Emrys is trying to tell me something," Merlin says one day, showing him the haphazardly drawn shapes. "Or in the moments after we've switched, and I have a faint grasp of his memories. I can't make them out, but the doctors said it might help if I draw what I remember." 

Drawn memories. Something Lancelot can work with. 

He looks through them, during his spare time. None of them are refined drawings with any definite shape - at first glance, the pages are just covered in splotches of colour, more like a child's painting than a memory. But to him, they're recognisable - the distinct red and gold of a knight's cloak over silver armour, the grey-green of Camelot castle against the rich colours of the surrounding forest, and even a mess of green and brown which he thinks looks a little like the training area which Arthur always dragged Merlin along to. 

He ignores the stirrings of nostalgia inside him as he looks through the pictures. Now was not the time to reminisce. 

He misses Camelot terribly, but it was gone, long gone. There is no saving the kingdom he died for. 

But there still is a chance to save Merlin. 

He tries utilising the drawings, during his sessions with Merlin. As Merlin's actual memories, so they should have a better chance of reaching him - or so he thought. It seems like Merlin has just disappeared, receded further back into himself than ever, and nothing Lancelot says or does convinces him to come back for real. 

"Any memory?" He asks Merlin. "Don't they trigger anything at all? None of it seems familiar?" 

Merlin shakes his head, looking more than slightly irritated. "No," he repeats. "I told you. They're not mine, they're Emrys'."

"Yes. But you and 'Emrys' -" 

"Are you really trying to help me?" Merlin interrupts, folding his arms. "All the other doctors told me that I shouldn't encourage Emrys to keep taking control, because he's unstable and I don't know what he's going to do. Why do you keep talking as if it should be Emrys?" 

_Because you are not the real Merlin,_ Lancelot doesn't say. _And I'm sorry, but you shouldn't have come into existence in the first place. I'm not even sure if you're real._

_You are the thing he became when he tried to escape the world and himself._

"Be that as it may," Lancelot says after a questionably long pause, "Emrys is a part of you which exists and you have decided, for whatever reason, to lock away. Keeping him repressed forever will only make him more bitter. Hiding won't solve the problems you ran away from - it only prevents you from doing so."

_Remaining as you are - fractured, broken - does nothing._

_I cannot help you like this._

_There is still so much left, a destiny you have yet to accomplish._

Merlin looks at him with a steadily more distrustful gaze. 

"I don't want to talk anymore today," he says, sitting down on his bed and looking away. Lancelot releases a breath. 

_So you won't speak to me today, either._

"Okay," he says, trying to keep the heaviness out of his voice. "I'll go. I'll see you tomorrow."

He stands up to leave, gathering his papers and opening the door, but he's barely stepped out into the hallway when Merlin's voice - the Merlin who remembers - stops him. 

"I chose," he whispers. "And failed. But this is ... the most I can ..." he looks as if he struggles to translate his thoughts into spoken words. "If you were my friend," he says finally, hoarsely, "you'd understand." 

Merlin is gone again before Lancelot has a chance to reply. 

  
Merlin appears more, after that, though only with Lancelot. He still doesn't change his mind, whatever Lancelot tries to say. Each passing day, Lancelot despairs a little more. 

_This can't be it,_ he tells himself. Merlin won't disappear like this. 

But when faced with the shadowed, despondent face of his friend, with even the dully glowing gold in his eyes seeming muted and sad, it's difficult to keep trying. 

"No point," Merlin tells him, his gaze laden with the weight of the centuries. "Arthur won't come. Albion gone ... won't rise. The prophecies ..." 

"He will," Lancelot insists, begging. "Arthur - he never let you down, just like you never let him down. Just a little longer, Merlin - he'll come back. And everyone - I'm still here, aren't I? Gwen, the knights - we always come back, too." 

Merlin shakes his head, misery churning in his eyes. "Haunting me," he murmurs, correcting him. "I can't move on. Not if you keep ..." 

_How many times must he have watched us die?_ Lancelot searches his mind desperately for something to say, anything, to make it better, but he only comes up with a silence bleeding with fear.

"I hate it." Merlin stretches out his hands a fraction, and they crackle with sparks, golden shards of light that dissipate upon touching the floor. "If they were going to ... make me a god, they should have done it properly." The lights fade away, and Merlin laughs faintly. "What kind of god feels regret, and anger, and ... loneliness, and frustration, in the way living, mortal humans do?"

"You're human," Lancelot says gently, kneeling in front of him, taking his hands. "Not a god. You think, and feel, and remember, like humans do." 

"Tired," says Merlin, sagging a little, his hands slack in Lancelot's grip. "Lancelot. _Please_. Don't ... don't make me do this again. I don't want to see it again. I've had enough."

Lancelot hates how as soon as he remembered his past lives, he almost completely forgets his medical training in his current one. 

And what could he say to the other doctors? "Excuse me, my patient thinks he's an immortal warlock but he's actually correct, and I'm trying to help him out of a spiralling pit of immortality-induced depression and regain his memories, but he refuses to be helped, would you mind terribly if you helped me reach him?"

Thankfully, nobody else seems to question why Emrys stopped appearing to anyone except Lancelot. 

"He's a strange case," the head physician says to him. "Every bit of information we get that might help him is valuable. He deserves to be saved. They all do." 

"I'll do my best," replies Lancelot. 

He can't afford to fail. 

So he tries, again, and again, and again. He tries to reach Merlin, to find the small, broken part of him that still remained and bring him back, restore him, a whole person again. 

_I know it hurts,_ he tries to say. _Everything being gone, everyone being gone, it hurts and there's no solution in sight, no way we know of that will heal these wounds. It must have been so hard for you. All this time, alone. But I'm here, now. Soon, I know we'll find everyone else, too. You won't have to be alone._

 _Hang on,_ he begs. _The world never ceases to surprise. Destiny never lies. Arthur will return, and everyone else from Camelot. We've always been here in some way or the other, haven't we? Don't you think there's a reason we remained?_

Every time, Merlin regards him silently with those deep, deep eyes. The barest hint of gold is the only thing remaining that convinces Lancelot that Merlin is still there, that he hasn't slipped away yet, that hope isn't lost. 

Maybe it's his terrified imagination. But each day, the gold seems to grow dimmer. 

  
Then several weeks pass, and "Emrys" doesn't appear at all. 

He has no idea why, and with each passing day of silence and confusion, his anxiety triples. 

"It's so weird," Merlin says to him, frowning. "I can still feel him, but it's like ... he's too scared to come out. Not like any of the last times, this I feel ... really, honestly terrified." 

"Terrified?" Lancelot repeats.

Something that scares Merlin. Something that is more terrifying than the thousand years he already spent alone as everyone else from Camelot ... 

"And the memories, too," Merlin continues. "Normally I just get, like, vague colours and shapes, you know? Feelings? But now I keep dreaming of a lake. And it's really, really vivid." 

Reaching over and grabbing his sketchpad, he flips through to the most recent page, and shows it to Lancelot, who freezes. 

A crest of white-topped mountains branching over the thick green of the forest. A lake - _the_ lake - in the centre. 

_Avalon_ , he thinks.

Then he notices the small detail in the corner of the drawing. A little figure at the lakeside, too small for any facial features to be drawn on, but enough to show the crimson cloak, stark against the rest of the forest. 

_King Arthur's messianic return is an aspect of the legend of King Arthur, the mythical 6th-century ..._

The realisation hits him with enough force to physically make him stumble back a few steps.

"Oh my god," he whispers. 

Merlin frowns at him in concern. "Lancelot -?" 

"Sorry," Lancelot says abruptly, heart hammering in his chest, standing so quickly he almost falls over. "I - I have something to do. Very important. I'm terribly sorry, I'll have to cut short our session today -" 

He's bolted of the room before he finishes his sentence. 

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> it seems i am incapable of writing chapters more than 4k words long :)  
> see you tomorrow with the final chapter!


	3. Rainfall

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> Destiny continues to fulfil itself, and Arthur returns - but Merlin remains unreachable. Lancelot and Arthur try to find a way to save their friend.

Lancelot almost gives up after four hours of searching, until he finds Arthur in a police station a few blocks away from the lake. 

The officers give him funny looks when he burst through the door. He hasn't even taken off his hospital nametag. 

"I'm sorry," he gasps out, winded from running. "The man over there - he's a friend of mine - um, we were just -" 

The woman at the desk raises an eyebrow at him. Lancelot subtly rearranges his clothes, glancing towards the corner of the room, where a man in full chainmail armour and a flowing red cloak struggles against three policemen. He nods awkwardly. 

"Yes. Um. Would I be able to ... take him?" 

Shrugging, the women reaches over and grabs a stack of papers. "He's been causing a ruckus for the last twenty minutes. We'd be glad to get him off our hands." She lets out a derisive sort of laugh, picking a few forms and pushing them in front of Lancelot. "Guy thinks he's some legend. King Arthur, of all people. Can you believe it?"

"He likes ... mythology," Lancelot says lamely. "Role-playing is his hobby. He gets a bit ... carried away, when he has enough to drink." 

"Carried away, huh," the woman snorts. "Understatement, if you ask me." She calls over her colleagues, who drag Arthur over to the desk. 

Arthur, spotting him, tears himself free from the officers, and makes a beeline for him. 

" _Lancelot_ ," he hisses, grabbing his arm and looking around furtively. "What's going on? Who are these people? Why are they all using magic?" 

"All good there?" The woman asks him, looking somewhat amused. Lancelot nods, giving her a cheerful, fake smile. "Of course. We'll be on our way, sorry to disturb you. I'll make sure he doesn't do this again." 

" _Make sure that I don't_ -? What kind of -"

Lancelot drags Arthur out of the police station as quickly as humanly possible. 

"Sire," he says, once they reach the relative safety of an open park. "Sire, I'm so sorry about that. I didn't want to seem suspicious to the police -"

"Police? What's a police?" Arthur runs a hand through his hair fretfully, staring in a mixture of awe and fear at the buildings of glass and metal towering over them from all directions. "This isn't Camelot. Where are we? Why is everyone wearings such strange garments? And what's with all the magic? Is everyone a sorcerer?" 

Lancelot shakes his head, still almost unbelieving. Arthur had returned. "No, sire. Those machines on the road, the lights - it isn't sorcery. It's technology, electricity. And we're not in Camelot. Not anymore." 

"I can tell," Arthur says, his eyes still fixed distrustfully on the cars that roar past, the lights that line the streets in uniform, orderly rows. Then he blinks, his face changing to one of alarm. "Wait. Merlin. Where's Merlin? He was - he was here, with me, when I ..." 

_When I died_ , he doesn't say. Lancelot hears it anyway, sees the shadow pass briefly over Arthur's face, sees his hand drift absently towards the place where the mortal blow must have befallen him. 

And Merlin ... 

"Sire," he says gently, and Arthur turns to him, watching him in trepidation. "I think you should come to my apartment, for now. We have ... there is a lot we must talk about." 

Lancelot manages to convince Arthur to exchange his cloak and chainmail for one of his t-shirts and a pair of jeans, and sits him down at the table. Arthur looks at the kitchenware and the stove curiously.

"It will take a long time to explain ... everything," Lancelot says, unsure. "First of all, you should know that you have been ..." 

"Dead," Arthur offers. Lancelot winces. 

"Yes," he says. "For a long time." 

Arthur nods. "Okay," he says, nonchalantly. "I can work with that."

Lancelot shakes his head. "No," he says, softly. "I don't think you ... when I said a long time, I meant it. A very, _very_ long time." 

A heavy silence follows, and Arthur frowns at him. 

"Very, very long ... as in, what? Fifty years? A hundred?" 

He says a hundred years like it's the longest time he can think of. 

"Anyway," he continues impatiently, "Time isn't what's important right now. You're here, so I can only assume ... everyone else, they'll be here too? And Merlin? You were going to tell me about Merlin." He looks around, like he's expecting Merlin to jump out of one of a doorway any second. "Where is he?" 

_He's in the psychiatric ward of the hospital I work at, fractured and buried inside of his own mind, so deeply that I'm not sure I can pull him out._

"Lancelot?" Arthur questions, beginning to look uneasy at his prolonged silence. "Where ... where is he?" 

_I'm not sure I'm ever going to be able to reach him. He's slipping further each day._

A sort of suspicious dread is starting to dawn on Arthur's face. "Lancelot," he says, more like an order. "Tell me where Merlin is." 

_I think your return was the last straw for him._

_He's watched us live and die so many times over the centuries._

_If he had to watch you die too, nothing would be able to stop him from breaking completely._

"I will show you," Lancelot says, standing up. He pulls down a spare coat from the hanger, and hands it to Arthur, who takes it and stares at it with dubiously. "He is alive," he assures him, and Arthur relaxes a fraction. "But ... I should warn you. He's different, now." 

Lancelot makes a quick excuse about finding someone who might be able to identify Merlin in order to bring Arthur into the hospital without suspicion. Nobody seems to bat an eye, with he is thankful for, especially after the almost crazed manner in which he left a few hours ago. 

"You said he's here?" Arthur whispers, as they pass a small crowd of doctors in the corridor. "Is he sick?"

"His illness is not life-threatening," says Lancelot, turning a corner. "But he's not ... he's not well." 

They enter the room to find Merlin sitting on the corner of his bed, his sketchbook lying open in his lap. Lancelot sees the drawing of Avalon spread over the pages. He doesn't seem to notice them come in, gazing at the image as if in a trance. 

Arthur starts forward, then falters. The relief that had flooded his face only moments earlier vanishes, his brow creasing in concern.

"Merlin," he calls. 

There's no response. Lancelot shuts the door quietly, and moves closer. Arthur takes another step forward, reaching out to touch Merlin's shoulder. 

"Merlin," he says again, a little louder. "It's me." 

He pauses. The silence fills every molecule of space between them with a heaviness that gets thicker and thicker by the second, almost suffocating. Arthur's hand tightens slightly on Merlin's shoulder, but nothing happens. Merlin continues to stare at the picture, unresponsive. A flicker of gold surfaces in his eyes, but it fades just as quickly. 

Arthur looks towards Lancelot helplessly. 

"What's wrong with him?" He asks, almost desperately. 

Lancelot moves forward, crouching down in front of Merlin. His eyes are blank, and it puts Lancelot on edge, but he does his best to ignore it. 

"Merlin," he says. "Can you - can we speak to you for a bit? Arthur's here. Just like destiny said he would. He came back."

Merlin's eyes waver. 

"Everything's going to be okay," says Lancelot. "You can come back now. Heal yourself." 

This time, when the ripple of gold surfaces in his eyes, they stay there. Merlin looks away from the painting, and after what seems to be an eternity, raises his head. Arthur stumbles forward. 

"Merlin -" 

"You came back," Merlin says, flatly, but Arthur flinches at the weariness in his voice. _It doesn't suit him,_ he thinks anxiously. _It's not like him._

"Yes," he says. "I did. Of course I did." He struggles to find something to say, faced with someone so familiar and alien. "Why ... Merlin, why did you ..." 

_Where did you go?_

A hollow laugh. Merlin raises his shattered-gold eyes to meet Arthur's. 

"Arthur. Do you know how long it's been?" 

Hesitating, Arthur glances towards Lancelot again. "No," he says, cautiously. "I - I know it's been a long time, Lancelot didn't tell me exactly ... but ..." 

"Over fifteen hundred years," Merlin whispers. "I stopped counting the days after the seventh time I watched our friends die. After I saw the world end again and again and again." 

_The name Emrys means Immortal and is of Welsh origin ..._

Arthur looks into the spiralling hollows of Merlin's gaze, and sees an immortality of pain. 

"The Merlin you knew died fifteen hundred years ago, with you." Merlin drops his gaze again, like it's too heavy for either of them to bear, and the moment breaks. "So you've come back. What does that change? Now I'll just have to watch you die, too." 

He falls back into silence, and Arthur falls with him. 

Arthur had locked himself in the spare bedroom as soon as they returned to Lancelot's apartment. 

"Sire," Lancelot says, tapping softly on the door. Arthur doesn't reply, but Lancelot can hear the muffled sound of agitated footsteps through the door, so he continues anyway. "There was nothing you could have done. You weren't ... alive. None of us were, not for long enough." 

"That doesn't matter," Arthur says furiously. "There's _magic_ in this world. There must have been something we could have done."

"You can't blame yourself for how this turned out." Lancelot knows it's hypocritical of him to say that. (He only regained his memories recently. If he had perhaps managed to remember earlier, somehow, he might have been able to help Merlin before he spiralled. He'd taken a five-year degree in medicine and three years of psychiatry training in the twenty-first century. Why was he still unable to help his friend?) 

"I'm not blaming myself," says Arthur, with a tone that sounds like he is very much blaming himself. 

"I understand," Lancelot replies. He hovers for a moment, the guilt curling thick and deep in his gut. "I'll ... leave you be, now."

Lancelot moves away, sitting down at the kitchen table, and sighs heavily. He hates the helplessness he's feeling, the knowledge that Merlin will most likely refuse to accept his memories, preferring instead an imperfect sort of solace in his amnesiac self. He doesn't even want to think about the peril that Arthur allegedly returned to fight. They'd already had their fair share of magical beasts and sorcerers intent on world domination back in Camelot. 

As Lancelot sinks into quiet contemplation, Arthur cracks open the door ever so slightly, then pushes it wider when Lancelot doesn't notice. 

Modern clothing is much quieter than armour. 

Arthur is out of the apartment and hurriedly retracing his steps to the hospital before Lancelot notices he's gone.

The few doctors that pass Arthur don't seem to think anything strange of his presence in the hospital, but Arthur continues to try and avoid as many people as possible. It takes him several attempts and a few wrong corridors to find Merlin's room again.

He cracks the door open. Merlin is no longer Merlin, nor is he still in the strange trance from before. He looks up as the door opens, and gives him a confused look. 

"... Hello," Arthur says, suddenly regretting not coming here with a plan. 

"Hi," Merlin says, still looking somewhat befuddled. "You're ... um, Arthur, right? Why are you here? Visiting hours are almost over, aren't they?" 

It's the way that Merlin almost doesn't remember his name, the way he says it like a stranger's, that hurts him the most. 

"I'm sorry," he blurts out. Merlin looks at him in vague alarm. 

"Sorry?" 

"For everything," Arthur says, moving closer to him, twisting his hands anxiously. "For not being someone you could trust with your magic, for not accepting you sooner, for dying and leaving you alone, for not being - not being able to help you, like this -" 

"Wait," Merlin says, looking flustered. "Dying? What are you talking about?" He squints at him suspiciously. "Are you another patient here?" 

"What?" Arthur momentarily forgets his train of thought. "No - _no_ , I'm not. You don't remember. I was - I'm your friend." 

Merlin pauses, his expression morphing form alarmed to thoughtful. He stares at Arthur's face. "You ..." 

"Me," repeats Arthur. He swallows the turmoil welling up inside him. "Please. I'm sorry. I don't - I don't know how to get you back. I don't know if I can get you back. And I still don't get why you'd do this, not really, but I promise I'll try to understand, so please, just ... come back. I don't know about anything in this world. Everything's not ... right, here, even with Lancelot trying to explain ... if you're not there, it's not right. If you're like this ... if you don't remember ..." 

There's something strange happening in Merlin's eyes. They're flickering. Like a shutter rapidly flicking on and off behind them, from pale blue to a dull gold, and back again. 

"I don't know how I'm going to make it up to you - if I can ever make it up to you - I don't know what I could have done, being dead and all, but _something_ \- I could have done something, to make sure you weren't going to go through the world alone -" Arthur's rambling now, he's sure of it, but he can't stop. There's a burning sort of urgency, a panic, something telling him that he has only this one chance to bring Merlin back, or it's all over. And if it's all over -

"Just give me a chance," he begs. "Let me fix it. Let me help you, for once, after all those times you've helped me. I'll do it - a thousand times if I have to - but I can't do that if you don't come back." 

_"So you've come back. What does that change? Now I'll just have to watch you die, too."_

Merlin's eyes, blue, gold, blue -

"I'll make sure," Arthur insists, fiercely. "I'll make sure you'll never have to go through that again, I promise. I'll find a way , even if I have to threaten the gatekeepers of Avalon to get back each time, even if I have to find a way for two people to live forever, in some form or another, as long as I can stay here, with you."

_As long as you don't have to go through what you did, as long as you don't become what you did, because none of us were able to stay._

He's begging. He's not even trying to hide it. Every passing moment thickens and condenses into a deep, ragged fear that weighs down on him, heavier than the world. 

"Just come back. _Please_. We need you. _I_ need you. I always have." 

He stops, his voice breaking, and manages to bring himself to look up, searching Merlin's eyes for any hint of the way he used to look at him before. Merlin's frozen gaze is still on him, unblinking. Arthur holds his breath. 

Merlin's eyes are still the same lacklustre blue as they were before. 

"Arthur," he says, slowly, and Arthur's heart stops.

_Did I fail?_

There isn't a hint of gold in his eyes, and Arthur thinks, _I didn't get through to him._

His rising panic is cut off by Merlin's next words. 

"He'll come back." 

Arthur stops. 

"I - what?" 

_Don't hope, don't hope, don't hope -_

"I think you got through to him." Merlin - the person wearing Merlin's face - smiles. Disbelieving, Arthur gapes up at him. 

"It looks like I'm not needed anymore, so I'll leave," continues Merlin. "But - he's been through a lot. Suffered in ways no human alive will know. So just - be gentle to him. Okay?" 

Arthur, still speechless, nods frantically. 

_I will. I'll do everything - everything I couldn't do before._

_He's going to come back._

Then, slowly, ever so slowly, the empty, pale blue gives way to a vibrant, glittering gold. Brighter than he's ever seen it before, looking like the sun and the moon and the stars all collapsed into a single gaze. Merlin - his Merlin - looks at him, really looks at him, and takes a deep, shuddering breath. 

Arthur moves forward, guiding, and lets Merlin cling to him as he breaks down into tears.

Lancelot comes bursting through the door in a panic after several hours to find Arthur and Merlin sitting together by the window, talking quietly. 

"Sire -" 

Merlin turns to him, and Lancelot freezes. 

Instead of the dull, lifeless blue eyes he had become accustomed to seeing, Merlin's eyes are a shining vibrant sapphire hue, laced with lively strains of fading gold. 

"Lancelot," Merlin greets, and this time - 

" _Merlin_ ," Lancelot says, and he _knows_. Besides him, Arthur grins, and Lancelot distantly notices that this is the first time he's smiled since he returned. 

Merlin gives him an awkward, almost timid smile. "Sorry for the trouble?" 

"Don't be," says Lancelot, and happily accepts Merlin's half-apologetic hug. "I'm just glad you're okay." 

"Thanks to both of you," Merlin says, glancing back at Arthur. "It was Arthur who ... convinced me to stop the spell that withheld my memories. But Lancelot, if you hadn't been there all this time, keeping me anchored the best you could ... so, thank you." 

"No need to thank us," Arthur says jovially, patting Merlin on the back. "Don't be so content yet. If I remembered right, I returned because the kingdom is in its greatest need, or something." 

"Oh," Merlin says, looking crestfallen. The expression is so familiar, the one Merlin used to wear after a particularly large workload had been given to him during his time as a servant, that both Lancelot and Arthur laugh. "Right. I forgot about that. Giving up hope that you'd ever return, and all." 

Arthur huffs. "Stop that. I'm here now, aren't I?" 

Despite his tone, Arthur's looking at Merlin like he thought he'd disappear if he looked away. Lancelot can't help but do the same, unable to tear his eyes away. 

"Right," Merlin repeats, gingerly standing up and stretching. "Okay. Arthur's back, Lancelot, you're here - looks like we have some work to do." 

Arthur and Lancelot both give him blank looks, and Merlin rolls his eyes. 

"Arthur came back. You don't think we're the only ones from Camelot who returned too, do you?" 

Lancelot blinks, confused. "But I thought - normally -"

"- no more than two or three of you reincarnate in the same century?" Merlin says, now rifling through his wardrobe for something to exchange his hospital gown with. "Normally, yes, for some reason. But this is different. Arthur was meant to return now, and the Old Religion must have known, so everyone else must have also reincarnated accordingly." 

Arthur looks at him in amazement. "You can sense that?" 

"Well, now that I'm not expending my energy consciously blocking out my true self every hour of the day, yes." Merlin turns to him, a small smile on his face. "So. Should we go find our friends? I promise I won't panic at the sight of them and try and erase my memories again." 

Arthur's face brightens, and he jumps to his feet. Lancelot follows quickly, overflowing with a strange mix of excitement and trepidation.

"Of course."

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> at this point I feel like this is less of a story and more of me trying to get rid of the angst that's built up inside me during quarantine haha  
> I hope you enjoyed ^^

**Author's Note:**

> the pacing in this chapter was horrendous i am so sorry for that monstrosity  
> Chapter Two will update on Monday! probably  
> see you next time <3


End file.
